We have studied the physical properties of Nd2O3 with neutron diffraction, inelastic neutron scattering, heat capacity, and magnetic susceptibility measurements. Nd2O3 crystallizes in a trigonal structure, with Nd3+ ions surrounded by cages of 7 oxygen anions. The crystal field spectrum consists of four excitations spanning the energy range 3-60 meV. The refined eigenfunctions indicate XY-spins in the ab plane. The Curie-Weiss temperature of θCW=−23.7(1) K was determined from magnetic susceptibility measurements. Heat capacity measurements show a sharp peak at 550 mK and a broader feature centered near 1.5 K. Neutron diffraction measurements show that the 550 mK transition corresponds to long-range anti-ferromagnetic order implying a frustration index of θCW/TN≈43. These results indicate that Nd2O3 is a structurally and chemically simple model system for frustration caused by competing interactions with moments with predominate XY anisotropy.
@article{arxiv.1808.10085,
title = {Physical properties of the trigonal binary compound Nd$_2$O$_3$},
author = {G. Sala and M. B. Stone and B. K. Rai and A. F. May and C. R. Dela Cruz and H. Suriya Arachchige and G. Ehlers and V. R. Fanelli and V. O. Garlea and M. D. Lumsden and D. Mandrus and A. D. Christianson},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1808.10085},
year = {2018}
}